


A Badge of Honor

by Ink_Gypsy



Category: Green Street Hooligans | Hooligans (2005)
Genre: Double Drabble, Gen, elijah wood character fic, fan_flashworks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-11
Updated: 2013-08-11
Packaged: 2017-12-23 02:28:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/920917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ink_Gypsy/pseuds/Ink_Gypsy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After his first fight, a young American feels like he's found his place in the world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Badge of Honor

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the fan_flashworks community in response to the prompt, "Bruise."

When Matt Buckner looked in the mirror, he barely recognized himself. He had a split lip, a gash over his right eye, and his left eye sported a shiner from its connection with an elbow, all the result of a joining in a fight with Pete Dunham and his friends. He'd never been involved in so much as a shoving match in his entire life, and today he'd been in the middle of a genuine, bare-knuckle brawl.

He had come to England, unable and unwilling to fight his expulsion from school, and found himself in the middle of an even bigger battle. Pete's mates had thought he was a wimp, a privileged Yank who'd never ever gotten his hands dirty. Then he'd jumped into the fray, slugging it out alongside them, and when it was finished and they saw he'd given as good as he'd gotten, they'd welcomed him into the fold, made him one of them.

Matt touched his bruised eye and smiled. He hoped it wouldn't fade too soon because he planned to wear it proudly. He knew his father and sister wouldn't understand, but to Matt it wasn't just a bruise. It was a badge of honor.


End file.
